Character Name Reclamation Coming

Blizzard

With the upcoming Warlords of Draenor pre-patch (6.0.2), we will be releasing sidelined characters’ names back into the wild. Any characters that have not logged into the game since November 13, 2008 will have their names freed up, making them available to anyone creating a new character or using the paid Character Name Change service.

How Do I Preserve My Names?You will need to log in to World of Warcraft and enter the game using each character whose name you wish to retain before patch 6.0.2 goes live. While it is possible no one will claim your recently released name and you might be able to snag it again, it is probably not worth the risk if you want to keep your names intact long-term.

Our goal with this great name liberation is to make sure new and returning players have a large and varied pool of names available to choose from—so log in now if you wish preserve your unused characters’ names for your journey intro Draenor.

Pickpocketing in Warlords

In the last week, several Wowhead users have noticed that there's a new pickpocketing system in Draenor!

Recovering Archeology Items for the Toy Box

Reward Systems Designer Russ Petersen has confirmed on Twitter that if you have deleted archaeology solves, they will still appear in your Toy Box.

Beta Healing

Watcher

Our target for both healing and dungeon tuning is something of a middle ground between Mists and Cataclysm. It's important to note that healer balance is not yet final, and damage output in our dungeons (especially pure melee damage on tanks, in light of recent mitigation changes) is still being adjusted. So in terms of the raw numbers, we're not quite there yet. The most helpful thing testers can provide is actionable feedback with regard to specific encounters (also specifying difficulty and which spec you were playing). We're listening and making changes on a daily basis.

That said, I'd like to help clarify our goals with respect to both healer gameplay and dungeon tuning. Healing in Mists, especially in raids and especially later in the expansion, suffered from three major problems: 1) the power of healing relative to player health pools meant that injured players could be topped off almost instantly; 2) mana became increasingly irrelevant as a constraint, with many healers actively reforging out of Spirit; and 3) "smart heals" accounted for a very large portion of healing done, meaning that for some healers their targeting decisions were almost meaningless.

Now, some might be thinking, "so you're saying healers were really strong - that sounds great to me!" The problem is that when healing was in that state, the only way we could kill someone in a raid or dungeon was with massive damage, fatal if the healer didn't react instantly; it led to sudden spike deaths, punished latency, and made healing more like whack-a-mole and less like a series of tactical decisions. And in raids, as soon as maximizing throughput becomes all that matters, healing risks turning into a rotation performed irrespective of the encounter or the incoming damage.

Our goal is not to make healing more difficult. Note that nowhere in the above did I say that a problem with Mists healing is that it was too "easy." We want to slow down the pace a bit, and for the challenge in healing to lie more in making decisions about spell usage and targeting, and less in twitch-reaction and sustaining a DPS-style rotation. This also means that the cost of a mistake is not a dead player, but rather a more injured one, giving you a chance to fix your error.

In Cataclysm, fresh 85s had very little mana regen, and if they attempted to heal a dungeon the way they'd been accustomed in late Wrath (e.g. lots of Flash Heals), they'd quickly run out of mana. In Warlords, players have significantly higher base regen, and less available Spirit from items, so that you'll start off with a much deeper mana pool than is usually the case as a new max-level healer, while avoiding the problem of mana becoming irrelevant once in endgame epics.

In Cataclysm, nearly your only efficient heal was also your smallest, and it was easy to run yourself out of mana and feel helpless as you watched your group die; in Warlords even if you are running on fumes mana-wise, you can still sustain a steady stream of Greater Heal or Healing Touch or the equivalent. You aren't helpless.

Now, as for dungeon difficulty, one of the challenges in adapting to new dungeons at the start of an expansion has been the contrast between players' habits at the end of the last expansion when they massively outgear every dungeon, and the different approach required when undergeared and running a dungeon for actual loot drops instead of currency. The ability to recklessly pull multiple packs of mobs at once and cleave everything down is something that you earn and grow into as your gear and knowledge of the content increases - that's never been the intended dungeon gameplay when the content was brand new, even for our "easy" dungeons in Wrath or Mists.

Normal dungeons should be pretty easy. Some of them aren't quite there yet. But you should feel confident that you can push the "Dungeon Finder" queue button and land in a random group with a high chance of success. If you don't feel that way about a given Normal dungeon (especially a level-up dungeon), please let us know why not. We have a solid chunk of level 100 Normal dungeon content that everyone should be able to jump into when they hit max level, and Normal dungeon loot will be sufficient to qualify you for Highmaul LFR when that unlocks.

Heroic dungeons will be somewhat more challenging, which is the reason for the Silver Proving Grounds requirement to random-queue for them. We're not looking to recreate Heroic Stonecore or Grim Batol or The Arcatraz, but there's a middle ground where mechanics can still matter.

Finally, it's also worth noting that in beta, we're scaling players down to pretty much the lowest possible level and item level at which you could be running a given dungeon. Nearly all groups in the live game will be better-equipped, but we need to make sure the content is viable at the minimum threshold.

Comments

Comment by Dracovarius

In other words:"We need money so pay for a month of playtime before anything interesting will be released, our sweet little milking cows!"

Comment by nik666

on 2014-09-15T12:21:59-05:00

In other words:"We need money so pay for a month of playtime before anything interesting will be released, our sweet little milking cows!"

It's called "Trade". I pay for something I like.

Comment by MetalGenocide

on 2014-09-15T12:26:01-05:00

Well that's all well and good with the name changes, but how do we find out what names will become available.I currently have a full character charter but am planning on deleting one or two characters at some point. As the names I want to use are taken by low levels (3 and 17 respectively) is there any way to find out if they will become available?

Comment by StarsOceans

on 2014-09-15T12:36:36-05:00

Well that's all well and good with the name changes, but how do we find out what names will become available.I currently have a full character charter but am planning on deleting one or two characters at some point. As the names I want to use are taken by low levels (3 and 17 respectively) is there any way to find out if they will become available?

You could make a ticket and ask, I had the name "Oak" freed up on Doomhammer because the character that had it was low level and was on a non-active account

Comment by jafs1981

on 2014-09-15T12:36:41-05:00

In other words:"We need money so pay for a month of playtime before anything interesting will be released, our sweet little milking cows!"

That makes no sence at all, blizzard has enough money to buy a island an call it "GM island". one month without interesting content? what the hell are you talking about?

Comment by supernapalm

on 2014-09-15T12:38:43-05:00

The scaling people's ilvl down in dungeons explains why quite a few groups I've been in on beta get totally steamrolled at the first boss. It's refreshing to actually have a challenge and need CC again in an instance but right now in beta some players are really struggling. Glad to hear on live it won't be as bad, just keep some of the difficulty please ;)

Comment by jafs1981

on 2014-09-15T12:39:28-05:00

Well that's all well and good with the name changes, but how do we find out what names will become available.I currently have a full character charter but am planning on deleting one or two characters at some point. As the names I want to use are taken by low levels (3 and 17 respectively) is there any way to find out if they will become available?

If there's a name you want to check out, go look it up on armory, or some place like askmrrobot. Not really a hard job,

Comment by breidablik

on 2014-09-15T12:48:37-05:00

"challenge in healing to lie more in making decisions about spell usage and targeting" = Monks mistweavers laughting about it... Renewing Mist, first target OK, the others RANDOM, Spining Kick = RANDOM players around you, Uplift Heals RM, same as RM. Tell me blizz, how can i decide who i'm healing if i need to heal AoE in a raid group?

Comment by jafs1981

on 2014-09-15T13:11:07-05:00

"challenge in healing to lie more in making decisions about spell usage and targeting" = Monks mistweavers laughting about it... Renewing Mist, first target OK, the others RANDOM, Spining Kick = RANDOM players around you, Uplift Heals RM, same as RM. Tell me blizz, how can i decide who i'm healing if i need to heal AoE in a raid group?

Have you tried the BETA? or are you just making their point! they are changing monks also... right? and for what i've seen, monks are getting the most changes in gameplay (healing).

Comment by Walkerfin

on 2014-09-15T13:11:10-05:00

Beta servers went just offline due shutdown message. I hope they fixing lag and dc problems now. Also there is many quests what are bugged out and it is no fun at all. It is very hard to play while it happens every 5 minutes. All dungeons are extreme hard and they all are 100lvl? Specially UBRS is insane hard. Dunno how it works in live wow since last time i checked it was locked out on LFG tool.

Comment by regma

on 2014-09-15T13:17:41-05:00

Ah Griftah. Everyone's "favorite" scammer. It's nice to see he's back again and doing a little more this time. :)

Comment by Walkerfin

on 2014-09-15T13:25:27-05:00

Ah Griftah. Everyone's "favorite" scammer. It's nice to see he's back again and doing a little more this time. :)

Also returning npc: BUDD! at cataclysm. I met him my garrison tavern. He was crying at bartender for not having shineys things from seas. He offers dungeon daily quest to players to bring him shiney thing. I was kinda surprised when i spotted him again.

Comment by Wint3rSt0rm

on 2014-09-15T13:46:26-05:00

the pickpocketing thing is awesome!

Comment by darkelemental1

on 2014-09-15T13:50:36-05:00

So does this mean there will be other class specific weekly quests or just rogues getting alittle extra pocket change over other classes?

Comment by breidablik

on 2014-09-15T13:52:18-05:00

"challenge in healing to lie more in making decisions about spell usage and targeting" = Monks mistweavers laughting about it... Renewing Mist, first target OK, the others RANDOM, Spining Kick = RANDOM players around you, Uplift Heals RM, same as RM. Tell me blizz, how can i decide who i'm healing if i need to heal AoE in a raid group?

Have you tried the BETA? or are you just making their point! they are changing monks also... right? and for what i've seen, monks are getting the most changes in gameplay (healing).

yes, i played the Beta and...Beta= all the things i said still the same.... Healing for Mistweavers is random.... the only targeted heal we have is single heal.... on Beta i can heal dungeon fine, because it's only 5 players, its better to heal them with single spell than AoE, but in a raid group i cant think i'll be able to single target heal the group, it'll take much time...

Comment by my1if34wow

on 2014-09-15T14:24:06-05:00

1. PickpocketingThis reminds me greatly of that grind where you have to pickpocket Heavy Junkboxes for Ravenholdt reputation.

2. ArcheologySince characters from the same account are now sharing other Arch solves (besides Mounts and Pets), would certain items not become repeatable.

For example, one character previously solves Puzzle Box of Yogg-Saron before WoD. Once WoD comes live and the item is now put in the Toy Box, would Puzzle Box of Yogg-Saron appear on another character?

Comment by karminacoil

on 2014-09-15T14:24:27-05:00

Yes, you can send a ticket asking the GM to free a list of names. They will let you know if that is possible and you will have to use the new available names fast before someone else takes them... like it happened to me once ;_;.

Comment by daftjack

on 2014-09-15T14:41:29-05:00

In other words:"We need money so pay for a month of playtime before anything interesting will be released, our sweet little milking cows!"

if you haven't played since 2008 then there is a lot of content for you lol reading is fundamental

Comment by tmptfate

on 2014-09-15T14:43:38-05:00

In other words:"We need money so pay for a month of playtime before anything interesting will be released, our sweet little milking cows!"

We should be able to downvote posts in News articles...

Comment by Bairot

on 2014-09-15T14:44:42-05:00

They say the same thing about healing every expansion , Beginning:"Mana will matter thru the entire expansion", Ending:"Players have so much mana the only way to make them use it its globaling players"